Side air bags make new cars much safer / Hyundai, Kia minivans get the top rating

G. Chambers Williams III, San Antonio Express-News

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4:00 am PDT, Sunday, May 7, 2006

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Side air bags make new cars much safer / Hyundai, Kia minivans get the top rating

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The newest type of air bags, the ones that pop out along the sides of a car's interior during a side-impact crash, are making vehicles much safer, according to recent crash tests conducted by the insurance industry.

Cars, minivans and sport utility vehicles with side air bags, including the new side-curtain bags that drop down from above the car's windows to keep passengers' heads from hitting the windows and side pillars, scored best in side-impact testing by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which is funded by a consortium of auto insurers.

Model year 2006 vehicles without the side air bags scored poorly on the side-impact tests, and none tested so far has earned a coveted "gold" rating from the institute for overall safety.

There were some surprises among the winners, though.

The institute rated the 2006 Kia Sedona as the safest minivan, and that rating also applies to the 2007 Hyundai Entourage, which goes on sale this spring. It's a virtual clone of the Sedona.

"The Sedona is the best minivan we've tested," institute President Adrian Lund said in an announcement of the results of the most recent tests, which are conducted in the group's state-of-the-art test facility near Charlottesville, Va.

"Other minivans have earned good front and side ratings, but they haven't achieved a satisfactory level of rear-crash protection," he said. "The Sedona stands out as the first to get a clean sweep of good ratings across the board."

The Sedona was among the eight current minivan designs on the market that the institute tested, including such consumer favorites as the Dodge Caravan/Chrysler Town & Country, Honda Odyssey and Toyota Sienna. The Sedona and Entourage are the only minivans to earn the top rating of "good" in all three tests: front-, rear- and side-impact.

The institute said the Sedona, which was completely redesigned for 2006, showed great improvement in the front-impact test over the previous generation, which was rated only "acceptable."

Entourage will begin arriving at dealerships before summer. Hyundai decided to use the Kia architecture for its minivan; Kia is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hyundai, and both are South Korean automakers.

The side air bags, which are standard in the Sedona and Entourage for all three rows of passengers, are just part of the van's safety story, the institute said.

These vans also rank high in protecting occupants from rear-end collisions, typical of what often occurs in bumper-to-bumper freeway and city traffic.

"In the frontal test, the Sedona's structure held up well," the institute reported.

"In the side test, curtain-style air bags prevented the heads of driver and rear passenger dummies from contacting the intruding barrier. The Sedona is one of five current minivan models with standard side air bags designed to protect the heads of people in all three rows of seats."

The institute said the Sedona and Entourage are the only minivans tested that have active head restraints, which "are designed to move up and toward the back of the head during a rear impact."

The reason that's important, the group said, is that neck injuries are the most common type that occur in rear-end collisions. That includes whiplash, which the group said is reported in about 2 million insurance claims each year.

The latest round of tests also included the first crash-testing of a gasoline-electric hybrid vehicle, the popular Toyota Prius sedan.

The Prius "was a good performer in the frontal crash test and, equipped with optional side air bags, also good in the side test," the institute said.

But because the group gave the Prius a "marginal" rating for seat/head restraint design, it was not designated one of the institute's "Top Safety Picks."

The institute said it conducted two side tests of the Prius, with and without the side air bags, which are a $650 option.

"Without the air bags, the Prius earns the lowest rating of poor," the report said. "The intruding barrier struck the driver dummy's head. Measures recorded during the crash indicate that a serious skull fracture and brain injuries would be likely to occur in a real-world crash of similar severity."

But with the side air bags, the result was "dramatically different," Lund said, earning the top score.

As for the rear-impact tests and the head restraints, the Prius scored the second-lowest rating, "marginal."

The institute said it did not conduct tests of the hybrid models of such vehicles as the Toyota Highlander, Honda Civic and Accord, and Lexus RX, as these vehicles are structurally identical to their conventionally powered versions, which the institute has already tested. No separate tests of the hybrid models were warranted, the group said. There is no conventional version of the Prius, however.

The institute gave high marks to the Subaru Impreza for its performance in the latest tests, but the high-performance WRX model was excluded from the good ratings.

"Subaru is a gold standard among small cars," the group said. "Subaru reinforced the pillar behind the rear passenger door and upgraded the side air bags to standard in the 2006 Impreza. This car also has head restraints that do a better job than those in other small cars."

The same goes for the Saab 9-2X, which is built by Subaru and based on the Impreza design, the institute noted.

"Subaru was one of the manufacturers that last year asked us to delay side testing because of vehicle design changes that were in progress," Lund said. "It's not uncommon for us to grant such requests as long as the design changes will be made in production models within a reasonable time. The goal of our crash test program is to encourage these kinds of improvements to reduce injury risk in real-world crashes."